Author: Burt Likko

A quick reminder — we’re going to start our symposium on democracy on Monday. The opening question to the floor: “Is liberal democracy viable?” Guest posts may be directed to my attention. Thanks, I’m...

A young woman from the PRC named Wu Minxia was one of two teammates to win the gold medal in synchronized diving at the 2012 Olympics yesterday. Her well-earned celebration was spoiled, though…

We begin with an amusingly bland description from the intentionally-bland wikipedia: “Pussy Riot is a Russian feminist punk-rock collective that stages politically provocative impromptu performances in Moscow, on subjects such as the status of women...

For fans of my “Great Cases” series of posts, I’m finally done with Johnson’s Lessee v. McIntosh. This is a complex case with a lot of intellectual rabbit holes dealing with war treaties, antiquated...

A year ago, Norway suffered a mass spree killing at the hands of a sociopath with firearms. Seventy-seven people, many of them teenagers, were shot to death and the killer remains chillingly unapologetic. The Norwegian...

Just the other day we were saying that “It takes cojones to strap yourself to a thirty-six story tall explosive device and ride it literally off the planet.” Well, Dr. Sally Kristen Ride had...

At the moment of this post’s publication, in 1969, human beings began walking on the surface of the moon, for the first time — and they came home safely. That’s a pretty damn remarkable achievement,...

We’ll be having our next LoOG symposium soon, starting on the first Monday in August (August 6). The subject will be “Democracy,” and the first question to our panelists will be, “Is liberal democracy viable?”...

It’s amazing to me that kindergarten remains a controversial subject, but a specimen in one of those great laboratories of governmental ideas, the state legislatures, has managed to come up with this…

In a post, and then in a comment thread about the Electoral College, Ryan Noonan develops the idea that the original intent of the Electoral College was for informed, educated people of diverse backgrounds,...

United States v. Alvarez — Ninth Circuit affirmed, the Stolen Valor Act is unconstitutional. Breakdown is Concurrence plurality by Kennedy, joined by Roberts, Ginsburg. Breyer and Kagan suggest that statute could be re-written to comply with...

I propose this as a collaborative post; I invite all the Front Pagers to add to this article as they see fit. Especially Jonathan McLeod, for reasons that should be obvious in just a...

It’s unclear to me whether the inequality symposium is over. But this issue is breaking on the news today and it feels like a long time since our last immigration controversy. So please take...

One of the reasons I’m (slowly) working my way through the great and politically important cases in the Supreme Court’s history can be seen in high relief in a New York Times/CBS poll released...

As a follow-up to my post two weeks ago about California’s jungle primary, the winners, moving on to a run-off, are incumbent Dianne Feinstein and Elizabeth Emken, the spokesperson for Autisim Speaks who earned...

This one took me a very long time to write. The subject matter was difficult and complex to research, the opinion dense, and I wanted to do the case justice. I’ve had a lot of...

The First Circuit Court of Appeals issued its ruling in the companion cases of Gill v. Office of Personnel Management and Massachusetts v. Department of Health and Human Services this morning. To the surprise of...

Your geocacher should read: 36° 8′ 13″ North; 115° 9′ 9″ West. On your navigation device, that’s 3000 Paradise Road, Las Vegas, Nevada 89109. From the airport, tell your cabbie, “Take us to the Hilton,...

I filled out my absentee ballot to vote in California’s June primary yesterday. California has recently adopted a “jungle primary” law, in which all candidates from all parties appear on the primary ballot for...